Although I went shopping last night and my kitchen is full of delicious fresh fruit and veg, Today I managed to make something out of store cupboard things I had before I went shopping anyway, typical!

I’ve read about dukkah in a few recipe books now and thought I’d give it a go as it sounded so quick and easy, it is. It’s an Egyptian mix of nuts and seeds used to sprinkle on salads, roast veg, hummus, or to have as a dip with some bread and oil. There’s so many variations of it out there, lots use hazelnuts, I didn’t have any of those in my cupboard, I had some pistachios so thought I’d try it with those. Thankfully they were shelled already, I didn’t spend half an hour sat shelling them!

Here’s my take on dukkah…

Ingredients:

100g pistachios
2 tbsp sesame seeds
2 tsp fennel seeds
2 tsp coriander seeds
2 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp mixed peppercorns (no need to use mixed, just use whatever peppercorns you have)

You’ll need a pan to toast everything in, a clean tea towel and a pestle and mortar or some sort of blender food processor type gadget.

Put your pan on a high heat to dry toast everything. Start with the nuts first. There’s no exact timing to this, when they’re starting to look and smell a little toasted take them out and pop them on a clean tea towel, rub them around in this to try and remove some of the skin from the nuts, don’t worry they don’t have to be perfect! Next toast the sesame seeds, pop them in a bowl to cool. Now toast everything else, once toasted let them cool then put them in a pestle and mortar or a blender and grind them until you get a fine powder. Add this mix to the sesame seeds. Just the nuts left, pop them in the pestle and mortar or blender and blitz them until they’re like coarse breadcrumbs, you want a bit of texture. Add these to the mix and then give it all a good stir around, give it a taste and add some salt to taste and there you have it. It makes quite a big batch and it’ll keep in a container in your cupboard for about a month.

My plan is to get some bread and give it a try with some olive oil, hummus and olives.